I don't hate anyone, be they poor, rich, dispossessed or someone who owns several mansions. We don't need phones, we just want them. We do need food, it keeps us alive. Nor do I see having a cigarette or lipstick as adding any dignity to anyone.

I don't own a mobile phone, I have no need for one so why spend money on something I don't want? But if I did and it was a choice between being able to feed my kids or play Candy Crush on the thing I know which I'd be getting rid of in a hurry.

Landline phones in the UK are often more expensive, a refurbished mobile phone pay as you go top ups, which most people have, works out cheaper.. but perhaps they should just use tin cans and a length of twine.

Many UK homes now have no landline.

Having a phone of any sort was only for the comfortably off or rich 50 years ago, today it seems it's everybody's right including their 10 year old kids to have a smartphone.

However they use the copper wire from the landline infrastructure for there internet connection.

Landline phones in the UK are often more expensive, a refurbished mobile phone pay as you go top ups, which most people have, works out cheaper.. but perhaps they should just use tin cans and a length of twine.

Many UK homes now have no landline.

Just wondering, if you tell social security you cannot land a job because you have no phone, and you have no phone because you think feeding your kids is more important, and they tell you, then feed them on junk food and stuff you steal from supermarket skips, and you take that letter to the press and cause a shitstorm ...

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Having a phone of any sort was only for the comfortably off or rich 50 years ago, today it seems it's everybody's right including their 10 year old kids to have a smartphone.

However they use the copper wire from the landline infrastructure for there internet connection.

Why are you insistent on making these facile, irrelevant comparisons?

People in the 1960s were incredibly lucky they weren't living through the 1830s Cholera outbreak in London. Those guys had it plain sailing compared to the paupers in the 1300s dying of the black death.

Having a phone of any sort was only for the comfortably off or rich 50 years ago, today it seems it's everybody's right including their 10 year old kids to have a smartphone.

However they use the copper wire from the landline infrastructure for there internet connection.

Cheaper again as most then use the wifi for contacting family/ friends via viber/snapchat/face time, keeps the top ups to a minimum, very few cost calls. Those that don't have internet use the town, libraries or work place wifi.. again reducing the need for regular top ups on their phone.

Re: The Brexit referendum thread: potential consequences for GB, EU and the Brits in

A decision on the future location of two key European agencies will be made today through a complex voting process.
London is losing the European Banking Authority (EBA) and the European Medicines Agency (EMA) because of the UK's decision to leave the European Union.
Sixteen cities are bidding for the EMA, while eight want to host the EBA.
More than 1,000 people work for the two agencies in London.

The Department for Exiting the European Union had claimed the future of the agencies would be subject to the Brexit negotiations, a claim that caused disbelief in Brussels. Speaking before the vote on Monday, the EU’s chief negotiator on Brexit, Michel Barnier, said “ardent advocates of Brexit” had contradicted themselves on EU rules.

“Brexit means Brexit,” he said, turning Theresa May’s line back on her. “The same people who argue for setting the UK free also argue that the UK should remain in some EU agencies. But freedom implies responsibility for building new UK administrative capacity,”

Yup. Have a look how easy it is to get social assistance in Switzerland. Then look at the levels of poverty and unemployment.

Not sure what point you're trying to make: the poor should sell their mobile phones and ...then what?

7% of the general population - five hundred and seventy thousand people - and over 13% of unemployed people in Switzerland are living in poverty. I've benefited from unemployment insurance in the past and was grateful the process was "easy". Easy for non humans, perhaps.

"...the annual Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (SILC) survey for 2015 revealed that 570,000 people were living in poverty. That’s seven percent of the permanent resident population and a slight rise on the previous year.

The BFS [Swiss Office for Statistics] defines poverty as being unable to pay for the goods and services necessary for a socially integrated life which in 2015 applied to those with a monthly income below 2,239 francs for a single person or 3,984 for two adults and two children.

Groups with higher than average rates of poverty included people living alone, one-parent families, those without further education and people living in a home where no one works, the BFS said in a statement.

The poverty rate for non-European foreign residents was also higher than the national average, at 11.7 percent.

...While the rate of poverty was higher among the unemployed (13.6 percent) than the employed (3.9 percent), nevertheless some 145,000 employed people were living below the specified income threshold in 2015. " - source

--
This is weaving off topic, though, no matter how relevant to our lives here.

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So jobs for over a thousand people gone and the associated EU money also gone. Salaries, rent, &&, say - £100 million per year?

Over 1,000 new jobs in the Home Office to handle registering EU nationals, another £100 million per year gone from the UK?
I wonder if these new Home Office jobs are included in the plan already announced by the Government employing up to 8,000 extra civil servants to cope with EU departure. Source

How many of these costs were taken account of in the calculations of the claimed Brexit savings and how many more of these unexpected costs will we have to face?

Not sure what point you're trying to make: the poor should sell their mobile phones and ...then what?

7% of the general population - five hundred and seventy thousand people - and over 13% of unemployed people in Switzerland are living in poverty. I've benefited from unemployment insurance in the past and was grateful the process was "easy". Easy for non humans, perhaps.

"...the annual Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (SILC) survey for 2015 revealed that 570,000 people were living in poverty. That’s seven percent of the permanent resident population and a slight rise on the previous year.

The BFS [Swiss Office for Statistics] defines poverty as being unable to pay for the goods and services necessary for a socially integrated life which in 2015 applied to those with a monthly income below 2,239 francs for a single person or 3,984 for two adults and two children.

Groups with higher than average rates of poverty included people living alone, one-parent families, those without further education and people living in a home where no one works, the BFS said in a statement.

The poverty rate for non-European foreign residents was also higher than the national average, at 11.7 percent.

...While the rate of poverty was higher among the unemployed (13.6 percent) than the employed (3.9 percent), nevertheless some 145,000 employed people were living below the specified income threshold in 2015. " - source

--
This is weaving off topic, though, no matter how relevant to our lives here.

Poverty is quite a broad term, and I'm sure there's people living under a bridge in Calcutta that may well scoff at that description. That aside, my point is that it's been proven time and again that employment is the best route out of poverty and the Swiss system does this very well. The way social assistance is set up in much of western Europe discourages employment. Living on social assistance can become a lifestyle.

Not so in Switzerland. You say you have benefited from unemployment insurance, well this in itself is the first step. It's an insurance, not a lifestyle. You know that you have a limited, however fair amount of time, before the cash flow dries up in order to find another job. This is the first incentive.

On real social assistance, the system is set up to discourage people claiming and so that only those that really need it end up getting it. Have you got any assets or savings? Use those up before applying. Is there any family that can take responsibility for you? If so, then don't bother us. If you take any money from social assistance, then you have to pay it back should you ever get a job again. Oh, and the money comes from your local Gemeinde so you're not just a burden on the State, you're a burden on your neighbours. If you want to claim from the State, then you have to become transparent to the State.

This is what I mean by "being cruel to be kind". Can you imagine if such a system was rolled out in the UK? There'd be riots. But it works! There are always going to be people in "poverty" in any society. The Swiss system just ensures there's less.

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So jobs for over a thousand people gone and the associated EU money also gone. Salaries, rent, &&, say - £100 million per year?

Over 1,000 new jobs in the Home Office to handle registering EU nationals, another £100 million per year gone from the UK?
I wonder if these new Home Office jobs are included in the plan already announced by the Government employing up to 8,000 extra civil servants to cope with EU departure. Source

How many of these costs were taken account of in the calculations of the claimed Brexit savings and how many more of these unexpected costs will we have to face?

Hammond just announced in his Budget speech that he needs an extra £3Billion for Brexit preparation; who will paint that on the side of a bus?

And we thought Davis's tour of the capitals was to drum up support for his position

Quote:

At a meeting between the Brexit secretary, David Davis, and the French ministers for defence and European affairs, Jean-Yves Le Drian and Nathalie Loiseau, on 23 October, the British cabinet minister is said to have left his hosts confused by barely mentioning the ongoing Brexit negotiations.

“Despite having billed this in the media in advance,” the paper states, “as a meeting to ‘unblock’ French resistance, Davis hardly mentioned Brexit at all during the meeting, much to French surprise, focusing instead on foreign policy issues.”

And Boris, no gaffes TG!

Quote:

A minister in the Czech government meanwhile told his Irish interlocutors that Boris Johnson had been “unimpressive” during a visit in September, but he expressed relief that the British foreign secretary had “avoided any gaffes”, according to the document, obtained by the Irish broadcaster RTE.

A candidate to retire abroad perhaps:

Quote:

The British judge in the European court of justice, Ian Forrester, is reported as having bemoaned “the quality of politicians in Westminster” during a meeting in Luxembourg with Irish diplomats.

And we thought Davis's tour of the capitals was to drum up support for his position

And Boris, no gaffes TG!

A candidate to retire abroad perhaps:

I have my doubts that the leak was accidental...

As the Republicans in the US are demonstrating that despite their Congress majority and a Republican President politicians rarely have the skills needed to actually get things done!

For example, a list of key political skills;
Writing and Research Skills. ...
Public Speaking and Presentation Skills. ...
Knowledge of Social Media. ...
Understanding Your Audience. ...
Crisis Management and Problem Solving.

This is why many people thought that Trump as a business man would be someone who could actually make positive changes.

Consequently it is no surprise that UK politicians in the Brexit negotiations are failing; maybe they should have given lead roles in these Brexit negotiations to the Civil Service?

Re: The Brexit referendum thread: potential consequences for GB, EU and the Brits in

Britain must accept higher levels of immigration from India if it hopes to sign a free trade agreement after Brexit, a senior Indian diplomat has warned, as he predicted it could take up to a decade to secure the deal.